


dead on arrival

by pepperfield



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Doomed Timelines, Gen, Male-Female Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-26
Updated: 2013-02-26
Packaged: 2017-12-03 16:26:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/700288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pepperfield/pseuds/pepperfield
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two lonely kids meet at the intersection of two meteors.</p>
            </blockquote>





	dead on arrival

\-- gardenGnostic  [GG] began pestering carcinoGeneticist  [CG] \-- 

GG: ok, my robot exploded   
GG: now what smart guy!   
CG: HOLY SHIT, IT'S HARLEY  
CG: COMMUNICATING WITH ME OUT OF NOWHERE OF HER OWN VOLITION  
CG: NO, WAIT, IT REALLY IS YOU, ISN'T IT, JADE?  
CG: FUCK FUCK FUCK, WHOSE BUBBLE IS THIS?  
GG: ugh what are you talking about  
GG: is it too much to ask for you not to be crazy and horrible for once  
GG: and just tell me what you want?  
CG: NOT EVEN YOU AND JOHN COULD BE STUPID ENOUGH TO CRASH YOUR FUCKING BOAT INTO A WALL OR SOMETHING  
CG: SO THAT MEANS YOU MUST BE  
CG: OH.  
CG: FUCK, I'M SORRY.  
GG: can you please stop being weirdly apologetic and cryptic  
GG: lets just get this over with  
CG: OK, YEAH, I CAN DO THAT.  
CG: LET ME JUST TRY TO REMEMBER WHAT WAS HAPPENING HERE  
GG: please dont tell me this is more time travel nonsense  
CG: JUST GIVE ME A MINUTE HERE.  
CG: YOU MESSAGED ME OUT OF NOWHERE AND THEN WE TALKED IN THE MEMO  
CG: ...  
CG: ACTUALLY, ON SECOND THOUGHT, LET'S JUST CUT THIS SHORT HERE.  
GG: no dont you dare you stupid jerk  
GG: you have something important to tell me  
GG: so just spit it out  
CG: NO, TRUST ME ON THIS ONE, WE WILL BOTH BE BETTER OFF NOT RELIVING THE MEMO.  
CG: I SAY THIS MORE TO PROTECT YOUR SANITY THAN MINE, THOUGH I GUESS IT WAS INFINITELY MORE EMBARRASSING FOR ME.  
CG: GOD, WHY WAS MY PAST SELF SUCH A TOOL?  
CG: WOULD IT BE TOO OBSEQUIOUS TO APOLOGIZE FOR HIM AGAIN?  
CG: AND NOT JUST HIM  
CG: EVERY FUCKING INCARNATION OF MYSELF YOU ENCOUNTER AND ALL THE STINKING GARBAGE THEY SPEW AT YOU  
CG: CAN I PREEMPTIVELY APOLOGIZE FOR ALL OF IT?  
GG: ok i get it  
GG: this is another dumb prank isnt it  
GG: haha ok if i act nice to jade now then shell totally fall for my trick cause shes so dumb  
GG: thats whats happening right  
CG: WHAT  
CG: NO THAT WOULD BE SUCH A WASTE OF ENERGY  
CG: BESIDES I DON'T DO JUVENILE THINGS LIKE PLAYING PRANKS, UNLIKE A CERTAIN SOMEONE.  
CG: WHICH REMINDS ME, HOW IS JOHN? ALIVE AND WELL?  
GG: no shut up leave john alone  
GG: he doesnt have time for your bullshit  
GG: and as a matter of fact, neither do i  
GG: this was terrible like usual  
GG: i am so tired of it, and i am done talking to you forever  
GG: bye karkat, it was awful knowing you!  
CG: WAIT  
CG: OK I'M DROPPING THE CHARADE  
CG: LOOK, I WASN'T TRYING TO PLAY A TRICK ON YOU, BUT YOU'RE JUST NOT GETTING IT  
GG: getting what? are you calling me stupid?  
CG: I DIDN'T WANT TO DO THIS BECAUSE I THOUGHT IT WOULD JUST MAKE THINGS MORE AWKWARD  
CG: BUT THIS CONVERSATION ISN'T GOING ANYWHERE  
CG: SO I'M JUST GOING TO COME OVER, OK?  
GG: wait what?  
CG: LOOK UP.

 

Jade does so.

Her first thought is, _What right does he have to look so sad?_ Then everything else catches up to her.

There's a boy standing there, or someone she assumes is a boy, and he's most definitely not human. A troll, then. Gray-skinned, horned, sweater wearing alien with a purple laptop under his arm.

"Oh. You really are an alien! Oh, god, I guess I really was being kind of insensitive before then when I thought you were just making fun of me," she blurts out. Part of her doesn't want to apologize, to back down to these jerks who have been making her life difficult for years, but at the same time, the situation has flown out of her grasp so suddenly that she doesn't even care anymore.

"No. No, it's fine. Honestly, I can't blame you, considering all the shit we put you through. Not believing us wasn't the worst way you could've reacted," he says back, tugging awkwardly at the hem of his shirt. His voice is less abrasive than she imagined. That capslocked gray text had quickly become associated with the most irritating voice she could muster, grating and screechy and basically awful in every way. But his is a little raspy and deeper than she thought it would be, though he speaks at the fast clip she expected.

"Soooo...you're Karkat? Am I saying that right?"

"Yeah." He looks at her sort of forlornly, his odd yellow eyes almost wistful for something that doesn't appear to be here. She thought he would be a lot more talkative, but sometimes people are different in person.

"You can come closer if you want. I'm not really mad anymore. I was just upset because of my dream, and I'm so, so tired, but if you're here then something must be going on." There's something she's forgetting, tickling the back of her mind, but there's been so many incomprehensible developments that she's going to put off remembering for just a little more.

Karkat walks over hesitantly, but not because he's afraid of Jade. He looks afraid for her, if anything. Like she's fragile and there's something he's hiding. He sits gingerly on the edge of her bed, his fingers bunching up the blue sheets.

"Jade, do you remember what happens next?"

"What do you mean? Of course I don't know what happens next, silly. I don't have time powers or whatever like you guys. If you're asking about my reminders..." Jade looks at her fingers. There are so many little bands, but right now they all seem meaningless, save one blue one. "Oh no! John!! Is he okay? You troll him too, right? Do you know if he survived Prospit?"

Karkat looks up at the sky, still midnight blue and covered in stars, disturbed only by a stray cloud here and there. "Dream John is probably fine. It's the other John you might have to worry about. If this is the timeline I think it is, one of my...friends," and he says that word so sadly, "might have fucked him over. Has he contacted you recently?"

"No, but he's busy. I'm sure he'll connect as soon as he's safe. Besides the meteor isn't here yet!"

He looks back at her. "When does it get here?"

"How would I know? I told you, I can't just look ahead at the future. It's not like I've lived through...this...before...?" Even as she finishes speaking, Jade looks to the sky. It's still clear, so why does she feel like she can see the meteor, larger than life itself, swallowing the whole sky, drowning her island in fire? Why is everything so hot and bright, when it's the dead of night and the ocean breeze is fluttering against her hair?

"But that's the thing, Jade. You have."

Jade watches as Karkat's sad expression warps into one of horror, eyes wide and lips drawn back to reveal his whole set of sharp teeth. She looks down at her hands, charred far darker than her skin, and her limbs twisted and broken, everything else crumbling to ash.

So this is death.

She blinks and her body returns to normal, but it's too late. She remembers now.

John never connected as her server player, and as the minutes counted down, she climbed back toward her house, meeting Bec halfway and curling up with him, watching as the sky bled out and the world started to burn. Watching her harbinger of death, so beautiful, so brilliant, bear down on her, and in her last seconds the universe, space itself, was laid out in perfect geometry to her. The physics of a plummeting rock, of a girl fated to die, of her friends infinite miles away: Jade Harley knew it all. A Witch of Space unrealized, doomed for the greater good.

"Like I said, I'm sorry, Jade," Karkat says. She looks back at him and is surprised to see a few red tears trailing down his face.

"Hey, it's okay! Don't cry, it already happened. Or will happen, whatever."

"Yeah, it's just, this is the first time I've seen you in person. I didn't anticipate it going quite like this."

"Don't worry about it. I'm sure when you meet your Jade, it'll go much better! Assuming you, uh, stopped being such a jerk. Sorry."

"No, I deserved that. But yeah, I think we had an understanding by the time we parted ways. And she and John basically said we were going to meet up sometime in the future, so I was building the whole encounter up in my mind. But I guess I fucked it up, here, huh? I was planning to be a lot smoother, for one. And hoping she wouldn't hate me even though I was objectively fucking terrible to her for at least half of our acquaintance. And if not that, I hope she at least remembers who I am. I mean, I know we really only bonded over one day of her life, but I still want her to like me, you know? I think I'm short on people who fit into that category at the moment."

He laughs, wiping the tears away with one long sleeve. "Look at me, you're the dead one, but I'm the pathetic mess."

"Well, living people always have more problems than dead ones! But if it makes you feel better, I think you'll be just fine. I hated you a lot up until a few minutes ago, but you're actually pretty okay when you're not virtually shouting about something or making people feel bad. If you think that you and your Jade were friends, then I'm sure she probably thinks so too. I really like making friends, so just try not to fuck it up too much and you'll be set!"

"Wow, Harley, thanks for that winning advice," he grouses jokingly, and she elbows him in the side, before lying back on her bed. Karkat looks kind of conflicted about doing the same thing, so she tugs him down too and they lie side by side, staring up at the moon.

"Hey, you never did tell me how you got here," Jade says.

"We're inside your dreambubble. Feferi, I don't know if you met her, but she helped make these things to float our dead selves around in the middle of fucking nowhere so that we'd still be able to survive or meet up after we died. I'm on this dank, depressing meteor physically passing through your bubble right now, and actually, Rose and Dave are around somewhere too, if you want to see them. Everyone else is asleep, I think, but if you really want I can go get them. You probably want to catch up."

Jade hums out a little tune, thinking on it. "No, that's okay. I really do want to see everyone, but I think maybe it's better if I try to find my Rose and Dave, and my John too. Can I travel through bubbles like you?"

"You can't careen through them like we're doing, but if you try to think of shared memories with a friend, you can probably find your way into their bubble. We're just flying through all our dead friends' memories like douchebags crashing a corpse party, so once the meteor passes all the way through, I'll be gone."

"Okay. How long do you think until you have to go?"

Karkat squints into the distance, as if he can see the actual boundaries of the dream bubble. "Honestly, I have no fucking idea. I'm no expert on this. But I think I've got a few more minutes left."

Jade smiles at him and points at the sky. "Well, I think my own meteor is arriving soon. Want to watch it with me?"

"That's at least ten different kinds of fucked up."

She giggles, but shakes her head. "I'm already dead and these are just memories, right? I just have to ignore the dying part, and it'll be fine. It can't hurt us. And you've never experienced this outside a life-or-death situation, so c'mon! It really is pretty great; I want to share it with you."

Karkat looks at her for a second before responding, a half smile lighting his face. Then he turns back toward the sky, so different from his own, and just as stunning.

"Yeah, okay, Harley. I'll indulge you this once. Give me a good show."


End file.
